This invention relates generally to the field of musical drums and is more particularly directed to a drumhead and associated drum hoop. The drum hoop is specifically adapted to be used in conjunction with hand drums.
Hand drums refer to musical drums that are usually played with the hand instead of with sticks, e.g., conga, bongo, djembe and bata drums. Hand drums have a generally cylindrical drum shell, typically constructed of wood, which has an open top and bottom. Shells for hand drums, such as conga drums, frequently have a shape which is larger around the middle and tapered toward the top and bottom openings. The top opening is usually covered with an animal skin drumhead tightened and tuned to a desired musical tone. Traditionally, such animal skins were tightened over the top of the wooden drum shell by the use of rawhide binding strips, twine or rope, producing a drum and head assembly not easily tuned or modified. While natural skin drumheads produce beautiful musical tones, they are also very sensitive to atmospheric changes such as heat and humidity. Large changes in temperature or humidity can dramatically change the musical tone of a natural skin drum head and render drums so equipped unplayable.
To address these disadvantages, musical instrument makers have developed synthetic drumheads closely approximating the musical characteristics of traditional skin drumheads. Synthetic drumheads are constructed from sheets of synthetic material joined to a drum hoop and formed to fit over the open top of a drum shell. The drum hoop is sized to pass over the open top end of a drum shell and be drawn toward the bottom of the drum shell by a counterhoop and tensioning mechanisms. Using such an arrangement makes changing drumheads and tuning of hand drums relatively quick and easy.
Being a traditional instrument in many cultures, hand drums are often constructed by hand, resulting in significant variations in the size of the outside diameter of the drum shell and the slope of the taper of the drum shell. As a drum hoop is drawn over the top of a drum shell toward the bottom of the drum shell for tuning purposes, clearance must be maintained between the exterior surface of the drum shell and the inner surface of the drum hoop. Contact between the hoop lower inner edge and the exterior surface of the drum shell will interfere with hoop movement, making tuning the drum impossible.
Conventional manufactured drum hoops for hand drums are constructed from a symmetrical U-shaped metal channel into which the peripheral edge of a synthetic drumhead is secured by use of a glue or resin. Uniformly sized, symmetrically shaped manufactured drum hoops often fail to provide sufficient clearance to accommodate the size and taper variations found in hand made hand drum shells and therefore cannot be used.
The present invention is directed to a uniquely configured drum hoop which has an asymmetrical cross section and an angled lower inner surface to maximize the available clearance between the lower inner surface of the drum hoop and the exterior surface of a hand drum shell.
According to a general aspect of the present invention, a hand drum hoop has an angled inner surface connecting an upper inner edge with a lower inner edge having a larger diameter so that the inner surface angles away from the exterior surface of the hand drum shell. Such a construction maximizes available clearance between the drum hoop and the hand drum shell, especially in synthetic drumhead/manufactured drum hoop combinations on hand drums which vary in size and configuration.
The drum hoop is preferably constructed from extruded material formed into an annular channel having a diameter sized for a particular type of drum. The annular space enclosed by the channel of the drum hoop will accommodate insertion of the peripheral edge of the drumhead sheet and resin to secure the drumhead sheet to the drum hoop.
An object of the present invention is to provide an new and improved hand drum hoop which will accommodate variations in size of the hand drum shell.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a new and improved hand drum hoop which will allow the use of synthetic drum heads on a wide variety of handmade hand drums.
A further object of the invention is to provide a new and improved hand drum hoop utilizing modern manufacturing methods which is compatible with handmade hand drum shells.
These and other objects, features and advantages of the invention will become readily apparent to those skilled in the art upon reading the description of the preferred embodiments in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.